A lot can happen in a few days

Left the walkabout on the last morning of my exhibition and headed straight to the airport as Izzy's shoulder replacement was scheduled to take place 48 hours later in London... leaving Karen and Claus to take the exhibition down! Me leaving everything to the last minute again...

Completely over excited to see that my exhibition got into SAA's inflight magazine, Sawubona. I should have had a diva fit and insisted on an upgrade!

Landed at Heathrow, my mum and Izzy met me. Lunch at Bella's then a walk in the local park, known locally as 'dog poo park'.

Me with my sisters and Ma. So amazing to be with them again

The following morning Izzy has her operation. A very long 5 hours later she emerges with a state of the art, custom made shoulder...

She's in hospital for a week during which time I turn into a vegetable. Daytime TV and junk food. Lots of magazines and visitors.

...including coffee with Karen & Claus's daughter Gill. So wierd, I was with her parents half way across the world only days ago

I stumble upon this article in Harper's Bazaar

I want to find out more about Kiki Smith and her work. I need to re read the article on her, so much to take in and think about but having read the article a couple of times, I'm fascinated. The book 'Women Who Run With The Wolves' springs to mind. Got to read this again too. Check out this link.  

http://www.clarissapinkolaestes.com/women_who_run_with_the_wolves__myths_and_stories_of_the_wild_woman_archetype_101250.htm 

Kiki Smith 'works in both two and three dimensions, in fabric, bronze, glass, wax, ceramics and paper'. She is classified, it seems, as a feminist artist but for me the mythology and story telling which seem to dominate in her work and speak of ' the psyche of the individual to the universal female experience' is what fascinates me. She talks too of 'calling to be connected to the larger whole'. I'm guessing here that her deep ecological concerns are wrapped up in this.

Another wonderful quote by her:
'Where you can go with art and what you can explore is infinite. The Universe is larger than your idea'

And guess what, she says 'I love the Leonard Cohen lyric: There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in' Can you believe it. Goose bumps.

Mosaic

I've been working on this mosaic the last couple of weeks, since the exhibition has been up. It's pretty much ready to be transported to its new home. Just a little more background to do and when it's been mounted on the wall it will be grouted. You can't really gage the size of this piece from the photo. It's a fair size, 1 x 1.5 metres. The front aloes are ceramic as are some of the leaves and then I've mixed glass and different sizes and types of mosaic tile and ordinary tiles as well as broken antique china to give the piece different textures. Originally there were going to be more sunbirds but it I gradually took them away and settled for one. Any more than this detracted from the aloes.

Thought about tidying this image up but my feet give a sense of scale

Last few days

Well we near the end of the exhibition. Another couple of days and another walkabout on saturday and then the show comes down. I'm really pleased with how it has gone and there are some new and exciting possibilities that have come out of it.

Here are some photos from the last walkabout with Estelle. Thank you Lara

The walkabout begins	Estelle starts her talk

 

 Estelle

 Moving into the Installation 'room'

 Norman, Estelle,myself and Paul
 

Hayley Bull